Line #24 Film/WhereHandsTouch


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/abbd9b182c635f8bf0cabb6f128ce116.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:Where Hands Touch]]
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4	''Where Hands Touch'' is a 2018 film about Leyna Schlegel, a biracial 16 year old girl living in Nazi Germany. As the child of a German mother and a black African father, she is despised by Nazi ideology, and in danger of forced sterilization to prevent her "contaminating" their gene pool. Leyna's mother Kerstin protects her by moving Leyna around, going from the Rhineland to Berlin with her little brother Koen. Her aunt and uncle aren't happy because the association endangers them. Lenya is kicked out of school due to her ancestry, and Kerstin gets false papers showing she's already been sterilized so the Gestapo will leave them alone. Seeking to belong, Leyna starts to embrace Nazi ideology, and begins a secret romance with a member of the Hitler Youth, Lutz, who sees past her race. Yet when Leyna becomes pregnant with their child, danger looms for them both... The film stars Creator/AmandlaStenberg, Creator/AbbieCornish, Creator/GeorgeMacKay and Creator/ChristopherEccleston.
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6	!!Examples:
7	* AllGermansAreNazis: Thoroughly averted. Leyna's mother Kerstin, unsurprisingly, totally opposes Nazi ideology given that her child is persecuted for having a Black father, and she for the relationship. Even members of the Hitler Youth like Lutz turn out to be a bit inconsistent about it (membership was mandatory, so not everyone there were true believers). Leyna's uncle has contacts with German communists, and helps to get false papers for her. To fit in, Leyna disclaims her African heritage and embraces the Nazi ideology, but naturally it doesn't work out for her, because she's not an "Aryan".
8	* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler: Leyna survives, along with her baby, but Lutz is killed trying to help her. She reunites with her mother and brother though. It's also noted at the end that most black Germans also survived, though many were sterilized or imprisoned.]]
9	* BlackGalOnWhiteGuyDrama: The film has an extreme example, with a white German Hitler Youth member falling in love with a biracial German girl during UsefulNotes/WorldWarII. Given Nazi laws, they must keep their relationship a secret, and the former [[spoiler:is murdered.]]
10	* ChildOfForbiddenLove: Leyna is this, as she's the result of her German mother's relationship with a black African soldier in the French service when they occupied the Rhineland, something that was condemned. Then her own baby with Lutz also counts, as their relationship is in fact ''illegal''.
11	* ChildOfTwoWorlds: Leyna is a biracial girl who was born to a white German mother and black French African father in Germany. As a result though she was born and raised German, Lenya can never fit in due to the pervasive racism against biracial people at the time, which only gets worse when the Nazis take power. Lenya does all that she can to conform, even adopting Nazism. It does no good though because of her ancestry forever being a barrier.
12	* ContrivedCoincidence: Leyna just happens to be put in a camp Lutz's father runs, then he gets Lutz a job there and they meet again.
13	* DisappearedDad:
14	** Leyna's father apparently went home to Africa long before. It's unclear if he ever even knew about her.
15	** We never learn what happened with her little brother Koen's father either (but he may have been born out of wedlock like Leyna).
16	** [[spoiler:Lutz, father of Lenya's baby, is murdered over their connection by his Nazi dad before their child's birth.]]
17	* DisproportionateRetribution / EvilIsPetty: Like so many depictions of the Nazis, a group of SS shoot a Jew because he wasn’t circumcised enough. It's obviously just a cruel game they play with him, though, since as a Jew they caught he would be doomed no matter what.
18	* FanDisservice: Leyna and some other female inmates are shown naked at one point in the camp washing. In the circumstances (imprisoned, with Nazi guards watching) it's far from appealing even with the good-looking ones.
19	* ForbiddenLove: Kerstin's past affair with Leyna's father. Leyna's romance with Lutz too. Both are condemned as a result of racism. In the latter case, it has actually been made illegal by the Nazis.
20	* GenerationXerox: Kerstin and then her daughter Leyna both fall in love with and are impregnated by someone society disapproves of [[MalignedMixedMarriage due to it being an interracial relationship]]. Then, they lose their lovers tragically with only their child left as SomeoneToRememberHimBy.
21	* GuiltyPleasures: Lutz's father is a Nazi but secretly enjoys the music of Music/BillieHoliday.
22	* HalfBreedDiscrimination: Leyna suffers from this continually, as a result of her biracial ancestry, growing up in Nazi Germany. Simply having her appearance means she constantly stands out from everyone else, and she's under the threat of being sterilized for her ancestry. After she gets pregnant from a white German boy, both she and her child are put in mortal peril.
23	* HeroicBastard: Leyna, who's a good person at heart (even if she advocates Nazism for some time) was born out of wedlock and is called "bastard" as an insult at several points (mixed race Germans like her were all disparaged as "Rhineland bastards").
24	* HeroicSacrifice: When the SS demand Krestin choose between her or Leyna being taken off, she quickly offers herself. However, this only postpones Leyna's arrest.
25	* {{Hypocrite}}: Lutz says when Leyna asks about the US that black people are hanged and burned there, saying he's seen it in the Hitler Youth meetings. Yet of course the Nazis feel little better about them than any white American racists, with their milder treatment only being because so few black people existed in Germany back then. Not to mention that they did [[UsefulNotes/TheHolocaust the same]] to the Jews and others.
26	* IJustWantToBeNormal: This is Leyna's desire, and Kerstin also wants it for her. Of course, it's impossible under the Nazis for that to happen.
27	* LoveAtFirstSight: The feeling Kerstin describes upon meeting Leyna's father.
28	* MalignedMixedMarriage: Leyna's parents' relationship was despised by many people. Her own relationship with Lutz has to be kept secret as a result of this-and worse, that it's a capital crime under the Nazi laws.
29	* MySecretPregnancy: Leyna must hide being pregnant, as she's supposed to have been sterilized. Also, it would provide evidence she's had sex with an "Aryan", which is a crime punishable by death.
30	* SecretPolice: The Gestapo are the bane of Leyna's existence, constantly harassing and tracking her down, with the ever-present threat of her being sterilized or worse just because she's black.
31	* SecretRelationship: Leyna and Lutz must keep their relationship a secret, as it's banned under Nazi laws since she's not "Aryan".
32	* SomeoneToRememberHimBy: [[spoiler:Leyna's baby becomes this when Lutz is killed.]]
33	* StarCrossedLovers: Leyna and Lutz are pretty much doomed from the start, as an interracial couple in Nazi Germany. They keep things completely secret as a result. [[spoiler: Lutz dies in the end.]]
34	* StateSec: The SS, who are seen frequently making checks of people's papers or rounding them up. Some of them humiliate Leyna's friend Gunter (as he's secretly a Jew) then shoot him dead in the street.
35	* TellMeAboutMyFather: Leyna demands this of her mother. She doesn't learn much however, just how he was an African soldier in the Rhineland at the time. At first, she doesn't even know he was in the French service-despite this being common knowledge, and part of the reason why the children sired by these African soldiers were so despised (plus simple racism) as they were with the occupation. His name is never even revealed.
36	* TheirFirstTime: Lutz and Leyna lose their virginities to each other.
37	* TranslationConvention: All the German characters speak in German-accented English, with only a few exceptions in some words. Since all the actors are native English speakers, this makes sense (though French is also spoken).

Context Film / WhereHandsTouch